How to Focus Your Real Estate Brokerage on Usability

In our industry, usability conversations tend to revolve around the latest and greatest real estate websites and apps, but user-centered design has even greater potential for your brokerage operations.

It’s time to redefine your process to focus on usability.

While I was co-presenting about Tech Trends at Inman Connect’s “Hacker Connect” last month, one of Melody Foster‘s ideas really resonated with me (Melody’s brokerage, Zephyr Real Estate, is a TRIBUS client). She said that brokerages should “stop shoehorning their workflows to fit into existing technology.” That means to flip the usual cycle and define your processes first, then only consider tools that can be adapted to your requirements, or be built custom to your needs.

It may sound like a huge ask, but there are actually quite a few options available to help make your operations run a little smoother and therefore increase your agent productivity and profitability. We’ll offer a few ideas below, ordered from the smallest to largest time investment.

Boost usability with custom real estate web-forms and templated task lists

Let’s start with some simple things you could improve with just a few hours of setup — no custom development required.

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By using a tool like Typeform, you can create marketing order forms, collect information about new agents, and even record client reviews so that you never have to rely on email again for those important details.

Better yet, Typeform also integrates with companies like Google, Zapier and more. Those integrations allow you to skip the tedious task of repetitive data entry and send form submissions directly where they need to be stored.

Usability Improvements With Forms

Next, I’d recommend implementing a system like Teamwork Projects so that you can keep all of your operational to-dos organized. Through this project management application, you can set up templated task lists, view project schedules (using milestone dates and their Gantt Chart feature), store files, send messages and much more!

It’s a system that I’ve recommended before, and we’ve even had a few clients adopt it for themselves after using it during our custom real estate brokerage website build and launch process. Like any system worth recommending, it also offers quite a few integration options.

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Usability with Project Management

Leverage integrations to save time and excess clicks

If you’re committed to an existing technology provider, it’s time to take inventory of which integrations they offer. Ideally, there will be options for fully integrated content — syncing data between the two systems and even loading data from one system within another. If a “deep” integration is not available, there are usually still some steps you can take out to simplify the usability of your real estate brokerage day-to-day systems.

  • Resource Links
    If you get consistent questions from your agents or staff on where to log into X service, or how to download Y form, take a few minutes to set up quick links from your brokerage dashboard. If you don’t have a dashboard, consider creating a non-indexed (and possibly password-protected) page on your website.
  • Single Sign Ons (‘SSOs’)
    Many services support SSOs these days, which means that by clicking one button, not only can your user be directed to another service but they can also be automatically logged in. This way they’re ready to jump right in and use the tool you’ve linked to, rather than being blocked first by a login screen.
  • Embedded Content
    Systems like Google Calendar, Tockify, Altos Research and Wistia (along with many others) offer embed codes that you can simply copy and paste into your brokerage portal or agent page on your website. This allows your users to view and interact with content from other services right inside your primary brokerage platform.

Go for a fully custom real estate brokerage platform

If the above list of tips just won’t cut it for you, it may be time to consider a custom platform.

At TRIBUS, our team begins by learning about your brokerage, your existing operations and your wishlist. Next, we create a project just for you — where your integrations are seamlessly brought together and you can dictate the flow of the system. Custom real estate brokerage websites are big projects, but so worthwhile if you’ve been frustrated by the limitations of available options in the past.

And if you focus the project around your process (i.e. more than just pretty designs), you can end up saving countless hours (and dollars) in the long run by eliminating excess steps wherever possible.

As a second generation REALTOR, Katie comes to TRIBUS after working for a major franchise brokerage and a prominent custom home builder in metro Atlanta, GA. While selling homes, she realized she had a passion for helping agents establish a meaningful web presence and build a CRM that worked. Since then she's become a Certified Scrum Master (CSM) and graduated from a UX program, all while staying grounded in real estate technology. Her background in the industry and her training in psychology have paved the way for her current user experience focused role, where she leads the product team at TRIBUS.

Katie has moderated and spoken at various events including the RESO Technology Summit and Hacker Connect - a tech intensive session of Inman Connect.
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